The Kremlin File

Seven

While Lambie covered the colonel, Caco and I took off Jerome’s jacket and shirt, tore the shirt into strips to tie him and gag him with, and left him on the couch.

“You stay and keep an eye on Jerome,” I told Caco, showing him the remote control for the door. “Wait for Lambie and me to get there, crack it open enough for us to go through, then close it. Well put the guard out of action and go for the girl.”

Lambie shoved his gun in my back again and we went out. Jeb was studying a racing form and didn’t look up. I had the Luger at my side out of his sight. When I was close enough, I shoved it up under Jeb’s nose. While he gaped at it, Lambie used his gun butt on the round head, hard. Jeb fell against the desk, then rolled to the floor. Whether or not he was dead depended on how thick his skull was. If he did wake up, I didn’t want him opening the office door so we used his shirt to truss him, dragged him to the cashier’s cage and tied him to the stool there so he couldn’t crawl. Then Lambie and I crossed the wrecked casino, heading for the elevators.

We were halfway across the lobby when an elevator door opened, a soldier staggered out, saw our guns and tried to duck back. I threw the stiletto, caught him in the jugular, dropping him without sound. Lambie hauled him behind the registration desk. There were no keys to Tara’s suite in the mail box, no keys in any of them, so I’d have to break in and not make any noises. We went back to the elevator and I collected the two gilded machetes the soldier had looted off the wall and dropped when he died.

So far so good. Now there were only 599 military guards to watch out for in the hotel. Of course, heaven only knew how many more were outside. We rode the elevator cage to the top, and ran for Tara’s door. I picked the lock with the stiletto and we were inside before anyone showed up in the hall.

The room was stifling, the air-conditioning turned off. Tara Sawyer lay spreadeagle on the bed in panties and bra. The underwear was not all she wore. There was tape, a lot of it, around her wrists and ankles and secured under the bed frame so she couldn’t move. But she wasn’t gagged. The soundproofing of the Sawyer Grand LaClare made that unnecessary. She could have yelled her head off and no one but the men in the next room would hear her.

She saw me and Lambie. Her face contorted with despair and her mouth opened to scream. I jumped and clapped a hand over her lips, speaking in a whisper.

“Jerome’s men are here. Be quiet.”

Her eyes flicked to Lambie. She thought I was a captive too. I told her he was on our side. The blue eyes went wide, dark, deep with anger rather than fear. I took the hand off her mouth and covered her lips with mine. I let her go to cut the tapes away while she whispered a question about Dr. Fleming. Had they killed him?

“No,” I said. “We got him away. He’s hurt, but safe up in the mountains with Noah.”

“Who?”

Of course, she’d probably never heard of the old black giant or his tribe... or his bag of tricks.

“You’d call me a liar if I tried to tell you about Noah, but if we get out of this town alive, I’ll show you. Even then you won’t believe it.”

I pulled the tape off quickly, to keep the pain as short as possible. Fresh perspiration sprang on her forehead in large individual drops. Her hands and feet were discolored, purpling and swollen because the tape had been too tight. She was in agony as the blood began flowing again, biting her lips, tears starting in her eyes. She couldn’t stand and it would be some time before she could walk. Still, I couldn’t risk carrying her through the hotel. If anyone tried to stop us, I’d need my hands and maybe Lambie’s too.

I wrapped Tara’s ankles and wrists in cold wet towels from the bathroom, letting them soak in. Then brought a cotton dress from the closet, helped her to sit up and put it over her head. She looked better without the dress, but the skimpy panties and bra weren’t exactly suitable as a travelling costume.

It took precious minutes before Tara could put weight on her feet, and more time passed while I walked her around the room until she could move on her own. Then I sent Lambie into the hall to make sure it was clear. When he put his head back through the door and nodded, Tara and I followed him in a hurry to the elevator. We ducked into the cage, and I pushed the lobby button just as a room door opened down the corridor.

We dropped to the floor and the elevator door began to slide. Through a crack I saw soldiers. Worse, I saw Colonel Carib Jerome, with a pistol leveled on the crack.

I dodged behind the metal door and hit the basement button as he fired. The lead slammed into the rear of the cage and ricocheted. It had to be magic that it hit none of us. Then the door closed and we went down. It took an hour by my count and we had to be mere minutes. I knew Jerome and company would be on our heels in the other car. If there was no transportation in the garage or if the ramp was blocked, David Hawk would be out of one more operative. Tom Sawyer would lose his daughter and Noah, bless his faking heart, would lose one hell of a good man.

Where Noah’s other man was, I didn’t ask myself. Probably dead. If Jerome had snowed Caco into letting him out of the office with a bribe, Caco had a bullet coming. The colonel was resourceful. It was obviously a mistake to have left poor, simple Caco alone with such a sharpie.

The elevator cage squashed on the air buffer at the basement floor, and we were in the garage. There were lots of cars here, appropriated from the evacuated guests and staff, but I didn’t expect keys in them and I couldn’t spare a second to look. A military truck was parked at the bottom of the ramp; it would probably be ready to move on short notice. But it looked to be a mile away. I pointed at it.

“You two make a run for that,” I said. “Get it started while I keep the elevator bottled up.”

They sprinted, Lambie holding Tara’s arm, the girl still not sure-footed but game to make the try. I saw them start, then faced the elevator. The indicator needle moved, tracking the descent, then stopped. The door began sliding open in front of me.

When it was two inches apart I poured lead in, heard a scream and hoped it was Jerome. I kept firing as the crack widened and there were more cries until somebody had the wit to start the car back up. I shot until the door closed, then ran for the truck. Lambie was in the back under the canvas top. Tara had the engine roaring and had left the driver’s seat for me. I thanked her for that. If it had been Mitzy Gardner, I’d have had an argument and there just wasn’t time. As it was, I still didn’t know what I’d run into outside.

I got under the wheel and gunned up the ramp in second gear. There was no barricade at the top. I headed for the road. At the front of the hotel I took a quick look and saw Jerome and soldiers erupting from the door. They stopped on the top step to throw rifle fire after us, but they hurried too much. The shots went low.

I careened from side to side to further spoil their aim and heard Lambie blasting with his short gun from the rear. I yelled at him to lie low behind the tailgate, but either he didn’t hear me or was too keyed-up to think. Then it was too late. I heard a short scream. In the rear-view mirror I saw Lambie stagger and pitch out of the jeep. He was lying very still in the middle of the drive.

The whole front of his shirt was soaked in blood. More bullets riddled his body, as if Jerome was making Lambie die for those of us he couldn’t reach. A shot exploded into Lambie’s head, taking half of it away. I concentrated on my driving; it took away some of the sickness at the pit of my belly.

The firing stopped. The mirror showed Jerome and his troops running for cars parked around the hotel entrance. We were still a long way from home. At the boulevard I skidded the rear wheels for the turn, straightened out and tramped the gas pedal against the floor. The truck was powered to carry heavy loads but not built for racing. We had a head start, but not enough to outrun the colonel.

We were past the shuttered city, bearing on Noah’s hotel, with decisions to make. I couldn’t beat Jerome on the shore highway. The choice was between hiding the truck in the old hotel’s shed and holing up inside or tackling the goat trail over the mountains. I thought the colonel probably knew about Noah’s use of the place and could trap us there. He wouldn’t even need to risk a fight. The building was tinder. He could burn it around us.

So it was the mountain trail. Our heavy truck could probably grind through the potholes with less damage than the lighter cars behind us, and they couldn’t cover the ground any faster than I.

Their headlights hadn’t picked us up by the time we hit the turn. I cut our lights, threw the wheel over, and was out of sight in the jungle growth when two jeeps clattered past on the highway. That was just fine with me. I stopped, took the flashlight out of its bracket, and went around to investigate the back of the truck. Maybe Lambie had dropped his gun inside. My ammo was running low.

There was no gun among the clutter of rope, shovels, excavation equipment, and three crates. As I turned away, the light beam fell on a stenciled word on a box. “Dyamite.” With a hand on the tailgate, I swung over it. The box was open and some of the sticks were gone, but most of them were still bedded in the sawdust packing.

Colonel Jerome wouldn’t go far on the highway when he saw I was not ahead of him. He would be back. And now I could be ready for him. We were a hundred yards into the jungle track. I dropped out of the truck, worked as I ran back toward the intersection, and had a charge put together by the time Jerome’s jeeps showed up. They came fast, made the turn, their lights sweeping over me where I crouched in the brush. Then they discovered the dark truck and bumped toward it with triumphant yells. As the lead car came on, I fit the fuse. When it went by, I threw the stick in the rear seat and dropped flat, burying my nose in the vines.

The explosion was immediate and close. The shock wave picked me up and threw me back in the road, stunned but in better condition than the men who’d been in the car. I lay dragging breath, hearing Tara’s voice and the sound of her feet as she came running toward me. I got up before I wanted to, waving her back, seeing the deep crater blown out of the road. Behind me a second jeep was nearing the turn. The girl and I made it to our truck, were in gear and moving when the jeep jammed to a stop at the crater. The rear-view mirror showed me Jerome’s tall figure scrambling to the ground, standing in the lights. Lead reached for us, fell short, and we pulled away.

Tara was all questions. I explained my find, bent to kiss her briefly while I fought the road.

“We’re all right now,” I told her. “They can’t come past that hole unless they cut some trees, and that’ll take awhile. Just set yourself for a roller-coaster ride.”

In the dark I almost rammed a tree at a turn. That made me realize we needed light to drive by and I switched them on. My watch showed me the night was waning. By the time we reached the roughest spots, there should be enough dawn to help. Under the roof of leaves where we were now there was only blackness, my headlights tunneling through. We ground ahead, Tara hanging onto the door to keep from being tossed against the top of the cab. She took it in silence for some miles, then gave me an apologetic laugh.

“Nick, I do believe I’m not cut out for this. I came on like gangbusters at the idea of coming here to help Dr. Fleming. It seemed very romantic.” Her laugh was embarrassed. “Now I see what it’s really like.”

“You learn if you’re in it.” I grinned at her.

So she was scared, talking to build herself up. We were coming to the top and she was going to be more scared. It gave me a very good excuse for relaxing both of us. I cut the motor. It was very quiet. I got down, opened Tara’s door and pulled her out. I led her into the bright beam ahead of the truck where I could see that we wouldn’t bed down on a snake or a porcupine. I took her in my arms.

Fright can be a very good aphrodisiac. Her mouth was as hungry as mine. Her body moved under my hands in a long undulating caress.

It was a long time before we collapsed, spent. But we couldn’t stay here. We stood up and I kissed her forehead. In the truck again, I smiled. “Feel better?”

She nodded, lying back relaxed with her eyes closed. Because of stopover in the forest there was plenty of light when we reached the precipice. I told Tara to keep her eyes closed for the next half mile. Of course, she opened them immediately, looked over the edge, and some of my good work was spoiled. She sat rigid, pale, but with her head high, chin up. Tara Sawyer was O.K. in my book.

We scraped along the cliff, gears whining, and then were past the danger point, on the last long lap of the footpath. My thoughts switched to Dr. Fleming.

We lurched up to where the road petered out, left the truck and climbed. I discovered something I hadn’t noticed on the trek down. The path went up one side of a steep ravine; behind the edge, on the far side, were caves where the overflow of the tribe made its homes. No one appeared to be in at the moment.

The thick plank gate of the fortress was closed. It didn’t budge when I shoved and I used the butt of the Luger on it, yelling for Noah to let us in. It was a few minutes before I heard chains clank and timber lifted out of sockets. Then the gate swung inward and the man in the white robe waved us through.

Tara looked at the long frame open-mouthed; he backed so the gate could be closed and barred again.

Noah welcomed the girl with gentle courtesy, told us Dr. Fleming was improving, then went on to the bad news.

“Our communication line went silent last night so we have had no word from the lowlands since you left. Can you tell me how the situation is developing in Port of Spain?”

Obviously, that the old resort hotel at the edge of town was more than simple camping grounds for the tribe’s visits to town. It had to be a nerve center for reports gathered in the capital, the starting point for the messages that had been relayed to the drums. If there had been no recent messages, that meant Jerome had raided the place.

Tiredness washed through me. I’d been on the move too long. This old fortress had been impregnable against kings, ships and ancient scaling parties from the sea. But today we only had my Luger and a handful of ammunition, Mitzy Gardner’s little gun, and a few cases of dynamite. Not much against a modem army. My guts quaked with weariness and I leaned against a corner of the thick rock wall to sketch in the picture for the old man. I finished by telling about my plans for the dynamite.

“I should’ve blown that cliff while I was there,” I confessed. “But I didn’t think of it then and it’s too far away to do it now. Jerome will be up that way with jeeps sometime today. I want to mine that trail, and I’ll need porters.”

Noah picked out a labor crew while I introduced the girls. Mitzy took Tara in tow to find her a place to sleep.